


A World Unseen

by cerasi



Category: Free!
Genre: Blow Jobs, Canon Compliant, Christmas, First Times, Getting Together, Hand Jobs, M/M, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-14
Updated: 2015-04-14
Packaged: 2018-03-22 19:29:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,561
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3740851
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cerasi/pseuds/cerasi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"He's always thought he understood Haru, but he’s wondering, suddenly, about all the things he doesn’t know: the way Haru feels about things that aren’t swimming, the world inside his head."</p><p>Rin visits Haru during the winter break before they graduate.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A World Unseen

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is dedicated to all the lovely people on twitter whose intense feelings about RinHaru finally led to me have some feelings of my own about it. <3 Certain elements of this fic were also inspired by the amazing [Haruka & Rin drama cd](http://free-anime.wikia.com/wiki/Original_Drama_%EF%BD%9EHaruka_%26_Rin%EF%BD%9E).
> 
> Some background and timing details here may or may not be realistic, but I'm just going to go with them. I'm also, uh, not sure why I wrote Christmas fic in April.
> 
> Title is from [Read My Mind](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zc8hbSM1zVo) by the Killers, which I think fits the mood of this fic pretty well.

It’s Christmas day, after the Samezuka dorms have closed, when Rin makes the train ride out to Haru’s house.

 _You busy?_ he texts, after he’s already paid for his ticket and gone through the turnstile. He doesn’t get an answer, but then again, he doesn’t actually care if Haru is busy, just if he’ll have to make a detour to find him.

He walks up the stairs and rings the buzzer, and Haru opens the door wearing a garish red-and-green sweater and a bored expression. “Come in,” he says. “I’m making some tea.” It’s a little unsatisfying how unsurprised he looks.

“Are your parents here?” Rin asks, as he shucks off his shoes in the entryway. He remembers hearing something last year about them being in town for New Year’s.

“They’re coming Tuesday,” Haru says. “Staying for three days.”

Rin tries to grasp if there’s some excitement or disappointment behind those words, but he can’t; Haru’s tone is as flat as ever. “Cool.”

Haru disappears into the kitchen and comes back a second later with two steaming mugs of tea. “What about you?” he asks. “I thought you were leaving yesterday.”

Rin makes a face. Gou must have told him. “Yeah, we got roped into going to my uncle’s place in Osaka this year, but I convinced them to let me stay behind a few days to keep up with my training.” He sighs and sits down heavily on the floor of the living room. “I thought Sousuke and Nitori would be around last night for karaoke or something, but apparently they both had _dates_.”

Haru nods sagely and sips at his tea. “All alone on Christmas Eve?” It takes Rin a second to realize that he’s smirking.

“Shut up,” he growls. “Like you had a date.”

“I was with Makoto.”

Rin snorts, defeated. “Of course you were.”

“We were babysitting the twins,” he says. The bland tone of his voice is deeply aggravating. “You could have come over, if you’d told us you were here.”

Rin doesn’t have a quick answer for that. It’s not like it hadn’t occurred to him to call Haru when he was lying alone in his dorm last night, watching a shitty movie on his phone to fill the hollow feeling in his chest. It’s just that he hasn’t quite sunk to that level yet.

“Whatever,” he mutters. “I don’t like kids anyhow.”

Haru shrugs and blows on his tea, and Rin finally notices that there’s something stiff in the way he’s holding himself, some tightness in the line of his shoulders. Somehow, despite the utter lack of context, he knows what it means before Haru even opens his mouth.

“I talked to a recruiter from Toyo University last week,” Haru says. “They want me there.”

 _Of course they do_. Rin’s glad that his heart has changed enough that he can think it with pride, at least the first time. “Fuck, man,” he says. “That’s awesome.” The chance to train with the coach of Japan’s national team—if Rin hadn’t been set on getting his second chance in Australia, it’s what he would have wanted, too. “You gonna go?”

He asks it casually, but for the first time all day, Haru’s gaze goes sharp. “I think… I might.”

“Well, yeah.” Rin lets out a soft sigh. “You should.”

“It’s in Tokyo,” Haru says, as if Rin doesn’t know that.

“Yeah, you can share a place with Makoto, huh?”

Haru frowns slightly. “He’ll be on the other side of the city.”

“Well—still.” _That’s a lot closer than I’ll be_ , he doesn’t say.

But maybe Haru is getting better at the whole other-people’s-feelings thing, or maybe Rin is just getting more obvious, because Haru is suddenly looking at him with wide, disconcertingly earnest eyes. “Rin,” he says, “you know it’s—Australia. That’s all.”

 _It’s not you_ , he’s saying, in his Haru way, _it’s not personal_ , and honestly, Rin gets that. He never meant it to be literal, taking Haru to see his future in Australia, and even when the possibility arose, when his coach reached out to ask, he couldn’t really imagine it. Haru belongs here. The fact that Rin feels like maybe he belongs somewhere else, like maybe he deserves to struggle in every aspect of his life to prepare himself for the bigger ones, is just one more thing that he can’t explain.

He didn’t expect anything different, but that doesn’t help the aching in his chest. He finds it unbearable, suddenly, to be sitting still. “Hey,” he says. “Let’s—get out of here. I didn’t train yesterday; I need to make it up.”

Haru frowns. “Iwatobi SC is closed this week,” he says. “And Makoto says it’s too cold to swim outside.”

“You really needed Makoto to tell you that?” Rin asks, then shakes his head because he doesn’t actually want to know. “Never mind,” he says. “I didn’t mean swimming.”

 

*

 

“Iwatobi Iron Gym,” Haru reads, dubiously. “Are you sure they’re open?” It’s the first thing he’s said in over an hour, since they made it here to this ill-frequented corner of town.

Rin shrugs his gym bag further up his shoulder. “They’re open.”

The gym is small and humid; it smells of chalk and decades-old sweat. The tension in Rin’s stomach eases as soon as he steps inside.

“How long has this place been here?” Haru asks, and Rin feels a twinge of satisfaction at the awed tone of his voice.

“My dad used to come here,” Rin tells him. “Before I was born.”

There’s a membership fee, but the owner recognizes him from the times he’s visited on breaks and lets them both in for a few hundred yen each. The place is quiet anyhow, at this hour of the day: just a bald man bench pressing in one corner and an old guy doing rapid sit-ups in the other.

They go to the locker room and stuff their jackets into adjacent lockers. Haru, who left the house in the same stupid sweater he was wearing at the door, changes into gym shorts and a t-shirt while Rin goes out to stretch.

Rin has spent a good part of his life cataloguing Haru’s exceptional features, but when Haru steps out of the locker room, it strikes Rin suddenly how slender and pale he is, how incongruous his graceful limbs are against a backdrop of sweaty mats and hard-edged weights.

“So what are we doing?” Haru’s deadpan is somewhat undercut by the worried line of his mouth.

“Let’s warm up first,” Rin says. There are two creaky treadmills against the back wall; they each take one and start to jog.

“We could have just done this outside,” Haru murmurs, after a minute.

“It’s like zero degrees out,” Rin says. “Jeez, Haru.”

“The only part I like is being by the ocean. This is boring.”

“Yeah, well. At least this way your lazy ass isn’t slowing me down.” He glances at Haru’s speed setting and grins.

Haru scowls at him. “This is just how fast I run.”

“Yeah.” Rin hits the ‘speed up’ button on his treadmill three times and gives Haru his best challenging smile. “Because you’re lazy.”

“That’s not it,” Haru protests, but he starts speeding up his own treadmill to match, and Rin feels like he’s accomplished something.

When Rin declares that they’re done, 20 minutes later, Haru is clearly trying to hide that he’s gasping for breath, and that makes Rin feel like he’s accomplished something, too, like he’s proved that Haru is a real, live person, after all.

“What now?” is all Haru asks.

“Now,” Rin says, “we work out.”

They start with the bench press, since Rin’s pretty sure Haru at least knows the mechanics of it. Haru stands to the side and watches as Rin loads two 25-kilo weights onto the bar for himself. His expression is less unimpressed than usual, and it occurs to Rin that he might have dragged Haru here at least partially to show off. It’s too late to feel bad about that now, though, as he slides under the bar and tries to clear his mind.

He’s used to this much weight, but it feels different when Haru’s face is looming upside-down over him; his arms are less steady than usual as he completes his reps, and it’s a relief when he drops the bar back onto its supports.

“How many do you do?” Haru asks.

“Three sets of eight.” He smirks, even though he’s feeling less confident than he was. “You gonna keep up on this, too?”

Haru huffs at him. “Just finish.”

Rin finishes his sets and then readies the bar for Haru, reducing the weight down to 10 kilos on each side. Haru purses his lips, but doesn’t argue.

“That should be good,” Rin says. “Go for it.”

Haru lies down on the bench and grips the bar carefully, one hand at a time.

“Scoot up a little,” Rin says, and Haru complies without even frowning at him.

When Haru heaves the bar off its supports, Rin can see the muscles in his chest tighten, can watch the shape of his breath as it leaves his lungs. Haru’s lips are pursed in concentration, and Rin suddenly feels glad that he can’t see his face like this when they race; it would be too distracting for him to stand a chance.

Haru’s arms are trembling when he finishes his first set, but he only rests for a minute before reaching up and curling his hands around the bar again. “Okay,” he says, and Rin nods.

Rin tries not to let himself think too much about touching Haru, at least when they’re together, but it’s hard not to when Haru is like this, spread out in front of him, muscles taut with exertion and skin glowing with sweat. Rin can imagine it like it’s a memory: reaching down and brushing Haru’s damp bangs out of his eyes, rubbing his thumb over Haru’s lips, tracing the curve of his shoulder—

“Rin— _Rin_ ,” Haru hisses, and Rin realizes that the bar is dipping precariously toward Haru’s chest.

“Shit,” he mutters, and grabs it with one hand, guides it back up until it falls onto the rack. “Sorry.”

Haru looks away and doesn’t say anything.

“You wanna take a break?”

“No,” Haru says, and grabs the bar again.

He finishes his third set quickly, his brow furrowing in determination as he pushes the bar back up for the final time. “What’s next?” he asks, and Rin smiles.

What’s next is deadlifting, which is convenient because they can do it together. Rin sets up bars for each of them, across from each other, and then uses Haru’s to demonstrate the proper form.

“Got it?”

“Yeah,” Haru says, and moves to take his place.

Rin likes deadlifting because it uses every ounce of his concentration, narrows all his energy down into a single point as he focuses in anticipation. The burst of energy when he stands up with the bar is exhilarating enough that he doesn’t notice until he’s gotten it back on the ground that Haru is staggering backward with his bar instead of lowering it. Then the weight falls to the ground with a heavy thud, and Haru follows it.

“Shit!” Rin leaps over both bars and kneels where Haru is sitting sprawled on the ground. “Are you okay? What happened?”

“I’m… no,” Haru murmurs. His wide eyes blink rapidly. “Not good. Feel sick.”

“Shit,” Rin says again, with more feeling. “Come here.” He holds out his hand.

“I don’t want to throw up on you,” Haru mumbles, but he takes Rin’s hand anyhow and lets Rin pull him up and sling an arm around his waist. Rin leads them outside to a shabby wooden bench by the door, where Haru sits and buries his face in his hands.

“Wait there, I’ll be right back.” Rin jogs back inside to grab his water bottle. When he comes back, Haru is leaning back against the wall, his face pale and emotionless.

“Here.” Rin holds out the bottle.

“Thanks.” Haru takes a long drink from it, then wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. “Sorry,” he murmurs.

“Fuck, don’t apologize,” Rin says. He sits down next to him on the bench. “It’s my fault.”

Haru shakes his head, opens his mouth as if to speak, then hunches over again. Rin can see the fine hairs on the back of his neck standing up in the cold.

“You want me to get your jacket?”

Haru shakes his head, but when he starts to shiver, Rin finally lets his twitching fingers have their way and rests his hand in the middle of Haru’s back.

He’s expecting Haru to ignore it, the way he ignores most things, the way the physical world seems to slide off of him as easily as water. But instead, Haru leans into his touch, and the next thing Rin knows, Haru’s head is falling heavily onto his shoulder. Rin goes very still, not daring to breathe in case it shakes Haru out of whatever magic this is. He can feel Haru’s warm breath on his neck, the cold dampness of his hair.

“You’ll come back, right?” Haru asks, so quietly that Rin can hardly hear it over the sound of his own blood pounding in his ears. “From Australia?”

Rin swallows and gives a tiny nod that brushes his cheek against Haru’s forehead. “Yeah,” he says. “Of course.”

Haru sighs, then, and for a second Rin could swear that he’s doing this on purpose, that he _knows_. He moves his thumb a fraction of an inch along Haru’s spine, and Haru leans into him fully, presses the top of his head against his neck. “Okay,” he says, softly. “Then I’ll stay.”

 

*

 

It takes Rin until that evening, when he’s pulling out the spare futon in Haru’s room, to digest the implication of those words.

_Then I’ll stay._

He wonders if there’s any counterpart to that.

“You’re going to be sore tomorrow,” he tells Haru, who’s sitting on the edge of his bed, picking at the hem of his shirt. “Sorry.”

Haru shrugs. “I can’t swim anyhow.”

“Guess so.” Rin sighs and spreads himself out on the futon. He's always thought he understood Haru, but he’s wondering, suddenly, about all the things he doesn’t know: the way Haru feels about things that aren’t swimming, the world inside his head. “Hey,” he says, as Haru is getting under the covers. “Are you looking forward to your parents coming back, or what?”

Haru makes a halfhearted motion with his shoulders. “It’s nice to be alone,” he says, after a pause.

Rin snorts softly at that. _Of course_. “Sorry for disrupting your solitude, then,” he says. He means it to be a joke, but he realizes too late that it doesn’t sound like one.

Haru looks over. “I don’t really get along with them,” he explains. “They can’t be bothered to live here, but when they’re home they act like I can’t make decisions on my own. It’s frustrating.”

Rin’s not sure if he’s ever heard Haru say so much about his feelings at once, outside of the few shouting matches they’ve had. “I didn’t know that,” he says softly. “That sucks.”

Haru shrugs and rolls onto his back. “It doesn’t matter. I’ll be leaving soon.”

“Yeah,” Rin says. He stares up at the ceiling and sighs.

Haru turns out the light, then, and Rin figures that’s all he has to say. He’s rolling over to sleep when he hears Haru’s voice from behind him, quiet and clear: “I don’t dislike it when you’re here.”

Rin lets out a short laugh, even as his heart leaps. “You ‘don’t dislike it,’ huh?”

He’s expecting Haru to huff at him and change the subject, or go silent, but instead there’s just a short pause, and then Haru speaks again. “I like it. It’s... nice.”

Rin’s heart is definitely going crazy now, and if he thought Haru had any idea what his words were doing, he’d be seriously pissed. He exhales slowly.

It’s been like this for so long—his whole life, it feels like. He isn’t used to holding back when it comes to the things he wants, but with Haru it’s different; it’s too _much_ , and he knows there’ll be no going back if he tries, at least not for him. He doesn’t think Haru will care.

But there’s something different about this moment, the expectant stillness of it, the way he can hear Haru breathing in the dark. He feels like it wouldn’t be unthinkable right now for him to say something, like it would make sense to hear it tonight, the answer he’s always known is waiting for him.

 _I won’t,_ he thinks, _not really_ , but for some reason he’s rolling over, opening his mouth to speak.

Haru shifts, and the sound of fabric shuffling against fabric stops Rin’s voice in his throat. _I could_ , he thinks.

“Rin.”

The sound of his name in Haru’s voice sends a shiver across his neck, down his arms. He stares up to see Haru at the edge of the bed, facing him.

“Huh?”

“We’ll swim together again.”

He sounds so serious that Rin wants to laugh, but he can’t; he’s stuck still. “Yeah,” he says into the darkness. “Of course we will.”

The silence is different now, and he feels like his chance has passed. He rolls onto his back again, closes his eyes to sleep.

“I’m not going to Tokyo because of Makoto,” Haru says, abruptly.

Rin opens his eyes. “I know,” he says, because it’s true.

“I don’t feel that way about him,” Haru continues. “If that’s what you thought.”

 _Wait, what?_ Rin has time to think, before Haru is sliding off the bed, landing at Rin’s side. Haru’s hands find his shoulders and push them into the futon, and then.

Haru is kissing him.

Inconceivably, the only emotion Rin can feel is something akin to terror. Haru pulls away, and even in this low light, Rin can see the calmness in his face, the way he blinks as he asks, “What’s wrong?”

“What the hell,” Rin whispers. He can still feel Haru’s hands touching him; it must not be a dream. It has to be a dream.

“Isn’t this what you want?” Haru’s voice is frighteningly mundane, like he’s asking why Rin isn’t accepting some meal he’s cooked.

“I never told you that.”

Haru huffs softly and looks away. “I’m not stupid.”

Rin thinks maybe he deserves that, but he also doesn’t know _what_ to think; it’s too strange to be real. He feels like all of this might shatter if he moves.

“Well,” Haru says, sitting up. “If you don’t want to…”

A note of uncertainty creeps into his voice, and it’s finally enough to break the spell. Rin doesn’t understand, but he’s not stupid either, and he’s never been one to let what he wants slip away from him when it’s right _there_.

“Fuck,” he says, sitting up, “no,” and then he’s surging forward, grasping at Haru’s face in the dark and kissing him with six years of pent-up longing and restraint.

Haru makes a quiet _mm_ noise and tilts his head, parts his lips. His mouth is wet and warm, and his hair smells like sweat even after his bath, and it’s finally sinking in that this is real, that this is _Haru_ licking at his bottom lip, clutching lightly at the front of his shirt. Rin feels lightheaded, but he’s afraid to stop, afraid that this will be his only chance.

It’s Haru who finally pulls away. “Alright,” he says.

“Alright?” Rin echoes, breathlessly.

“We can do that.”

“You _want_ to?” Rin has to ask, because he’s pretty sure, judging by Haru’s reactions, but it’s still hard to believe.

Haru ducks his head a little. “Yeah,” he murmurs, and Rin finally perceives that the calm tone of his voice isn’t the whole story, that he’s probably blushing. A sharp thrill goes through him at the thought.

He leans in again, and the small hitch of Haru’s breath when their lips touch feels like pure victory. “Fucking hell,” he breathes, and then he kisses Haru long and deep, losing himself in the taste of his mouth. When they break apart this time, Haru makes a soft, displeased sound, and it suddenly strikes Rin how strange that is, how strange _all_ of this is.

“Shit,” he says, “you really knew? Why didn’t you ever say anything?” It doesn’t matter, really, but then again maybe it does.

Haru shrugs. “I knew what you wanted,” he says. “I had to think about it.”

“Oh.” _Took you long enough_ , Rin wants to say, but he doesn’t. There’s actually something kind of wonderful about the idea of Haru thinking about him, thinking about _this_ for who knows how long before making up his mind. It’s even clearer to him now, how little he really understands about this person who’s been the center of his world for as long as he can remember. The thought that he might be able to find out what he’s missed is exhilarating.

“Rin…” Haru reaches out and trails his fingers along Rin’s wrist, then circles it to tug him close. “I want to kiss more,” he says, and Rin has absolutely no intention of denying him.

But he’s finally getting his bearings, getting used to the idea that this is his life now, that Nanase Haruka likes kissing and wants to kiss _him_ and might actually be getting a little desperate for it, judging by the sound he makes when Rin presses a kiss to the corner of his mouth. He’s starting to wonder what other impossible dreams might be within his reach.

He starts with this one: ducking his head down and kissing the smooth skin under Haru’s jaw, trailing down his neck. Even if he’d tried, though, he’d never have been able to imagine the way Haru arches his back, the breathy sound of his voice as he gasps out, “ _Rin_.”

“Fuck,” Rin mutters, and drops his head limply against Haru’s shoulder, his brain shorting out with arousal. “ _Fuck_.”

There’s silence for a moment, and then Haru’s voice, gravelly and a little annoyed: “You didn’t have to stop.”

“I know.”

“I liked it.”

“I _know_. Jeez, Haru. Just… give me a minute, okay?”

Haru makes a small, grumpy noise, but tilts his head to press against Rin’s. “You shouldn’t be having second thoughts,” he says. “I’m the one who just decided on this today.”

“I’m not having second thoughts,” Rin protests. “It’s just—I like you so damn much, and I never imagined you’d actually…” Then he lifts his head, cutting himself off. “Wait, are _you_ having second thoughts?”

Haru blinks at him. “No.”

“Oh. Good.”

Rin can dimly see the corner of Haru’s mouth pulling into a smile. “You can keep telling me how much you like me, if you want.”

“Fuck off,” Rin growls, and kisses him fiercely. Haru moans a little, and Rin thinks that he could probably die happy just like this, with Haru’s tongue slipping into his mouth and Haru’s hands coming up to grip his arms.

He’s been wrong this whole time, he realizes, thinking of Haru as someone cool and distant, because right now Haru is neither of those things: he’s warm and close and _responsive_ , more responsive than he’s been any of the thousands of times Rin has tried to rile him up. When Rin reaches out blindly to touch his chest, Haru’s fingernails dig into his skin, and when he slips his hand under Haru’s t-shirt, Haru makes a small noise that has Rin pulling away from the kiss to bite down on his own lower lip.

“You can,” Haru says quietly.

“Huh?”

“You can touch me more. If you want.” His monotone hasn’t changed, but there’s something about his stilted cadence that makes Rin think he’s flustered.

“Yeah?” Rin asks, hoarsely. He splays his fingers out across the warm skin of Haru’s stomach. “You mean—uh…” His hand twitches downwards, but he chickens out and slides it up instead, brushing his thumb over one of Haru’s nipples.

Haru exhales, licks his parted lips. “Oh,” he says. “That’s good, too.”

 _Fuck_ , Rin thinks, and turns a little so he can slide his other hand up Haru’s thigh. “How about this?”

Haru goes quiet, his body tensing. Then nods, and Rin feels his pulse leap. “If you want to,” Haru says, again.

If he weren’t so tense, Rin would probably find that funny; it’s _all_ he wants, it’s a goddamned dream come true, but somehow he can barely make himself move. He rubs his thumb over the elastic waistband of Haru’s pajama pants. “So did you think about this, too?” he asks.

He means it as a tease, a way to stall until he’s ready, but Haru just nods seriously. “Yes,” he whispers, and that—well. That does the job, too.

“Shit.” Rin crushes him with a kiss, and a few awkward seconds of fumbling and re-orientation later, Haru is sitting in his lap, his pajama pants pushed down to his thighs. His cock is hard in Rin’s hand, and Rin’s getting that feeling again, the one that tells him he’s going to wake up soon because this can’t actually be real.

“Rin,” Haru murmurs, _sighs_ , and Rin decides that on the other hand, he’s never been more awake in his life. When he moves his hand on Haru’s cock, Haru starts panting softly, gasping around each of his breaths, and Rin has to kiss him to drown out the sound of it before it does something irreparable to his mind.

He’s not exactly sure what’s normal, when it comes to how long something like this is supposed to last when it’s with another person who only has a limited idea of what the fuck he’s doing, but he thinks that this is maybe easier than it should be, or at least easier than things with Haru usually are. He can feel how strained with tension Haru’s body is, how his hips are starting to move in counterpart to Rin’s hand after just a minute or two. “Rin,” Haru whispers. Their foreheads are pressed together, close enough that he can see how wide Haru’s eyes are, feel the way he swallows over and over as his legs tighten around Rin’s thighs.

“Are you—uh,” Rin whispers, but he doesn’t get to the end of his question because suddenly Haru is clutching his shoulders tightly, gasping, _shaking_. “Oh fuck,” Rin whispers, and then Haru is tipping his head back, moaning as he comes onto Rin’s hand.

“Oh,” Haru says, faintly, and then lowers his arms, drops his head down onto Rin’s shoulder. He takes a shuddering breath. “That was good.”

“Holy _shit_.”

They’re both still for a few seconds, breathing heavily. Then, finally, Rin nudges the side of Haru’s head.

“Do you have any—uh. Tissues?”

Haru sighs and slides off of him easily, onto the futon. “In the bathroom,” he murmurs. He sounds like he’s about to fall asleep.

“...Seriously?” Rin mutters, even though he doesn’t think he has the heart to be annoyed, not even if he ends up jerking off in Haru’s bathroom later.

But when he comes back with clean hands and a wad of tissues, Haru is sitting up on the futon. It takes Rin a second for his eyes to readjust well enough to see Haru’s expectant expression. “I can do it for you, too.”

Rin’s stomach leaps, and he steps closer. “Yeah?”

“Or I can do something else,” Haru says, evenly, and then moves forward to catch the sides of Rin’s thighs between his hands.

“What? Haru—”

Haru tugs him forward, and Rin has just a second to feel embarrassed by how hard his dick still is before Haru is _kissing it_ through the fabric of his sweatpants.

“What,” Rin breathes. Haru stares up calmly into his eyes as he presses a few more kisses up and down Rin’s clothed erection, and it’s simultaneously the weirdest and the most arousing thing Rin’s ever seen. Haru’s hands creep up to his waistband, and Rin suddenly realizes what’s happening.

He laughs, breathily. “Shit, Haru, are you seriously trying to one-up me?”

“Yeah,” Haru says, and tugs Rin’s pants down to his knees.

“Jeez, okay, just—” Rin puts a hand on Haru’s shoulder, keeping him at bay, and gulps in a breath of air. “Okay.”

“You don’t want me to?”

“No, shit, I do. But, maybe—” He kicks his pants and his underwear off and turns to sit on the edge of Haru’s bed. “Like this?” he asks. He curses himself for sounding nervous, but Haru doesn’t say anything about it; he just nods and shuffles over, situates himself between Rin’s knees. His hands brush the tops of Rin’s thighs.

He leans in and picks up where he left off, placing dry kisses along the shaft of Rin’s cock. It’s fucking strange, and it kind of tickles, but it feels good, too; Rin can’t say he doesn’t like it. Then Haru’s tongue slips out to deliver a tiny lick just under the head of his cock, and Rin exhales sharply, his hands clutching at the edge of the mattress. Haru lets out a soft _hmm_ and does it again, a few more times, until Rin is biting back the urge to laugh or moan or _something_.

He’s suddenly very aware of how still the air is around him; of how little time has passed since he was working up the courage to maybe, possibly tell Haru what he already knew; of how surreal it is that it’s Christmas and that he’s getting the greatest present he could imagine. Haru’s tongue is soft and relentless, covering his cock in careful licks, and it’s almost unbearable; his eyes are starting to tear up, and he knows he’ll never live that down if Haru notices.

“Haru,” he rasps, “stop— _teasing_ me, fuck.”

Haru blinks up at him, his tongue still extended. “What?” His voice is flat, not coy in the slightest, and Rin is suddenly struck by two things: the memory of the book he found under Haru’s bed, the one of _mineral springs_ , and the realization that he’s getting a blowjob from someone who in all likelihood has never seen porn in his life.

He can’t help it; he laughs. “Sorry,” he says, as soon as he starts, “I’m sorry—no, it’s good, it’s just, you might want to…”

Haru frowns, but he catches on quickly, and the rest of Rin’s complaint gets caught in his throat as Haru finally takes the tip of his cock into his mouth.

“Oh, fuck,” Rin whispers. “Yeah, like that.” He reaches down to hold the base of his dick, and Haru follows his lead, wraps his hand around it, and—yeah. _Yeah_.

He’s not sure if it’s actually a great blowjob, but he could probably come just from watching Haru’s expression of intense concentration, listening to the wet sounds his tongue is making. “God, Haru,” he murmurs. He feels dizzy and wonderful; he knows he’s getting close, and he wants to slow this moment down so that he can memorize it. “Fuck,” he whispers, “fuck, Haru, I’m gonna come— _Haru_ —”

He tries to wait until Haru backs off, but he can’t; the rush of pleasure hits him hard, and he shudders and makes an embarrassingly loud noise as he comes half in Haru’s mouth and half onto his lips, his chin. He grasps at his knees and tries to catch his breath, to keep from moaning as the last of it rolls through him. “Sorry,” he whispers. He reaches toward Haru’s face, but Haru just grabs the tissues and wipes himself clean.

“Was it good?”

“Yeah. Fuck, yeah.”

Rin catches Haru’s small, pleased expression as he climbs onto the bed and crawls under the covers behind where Rin is sitting.

Rin waits for a second, but Haru doesn’t say anything else. “Do you—uh. Want me to sleep here?” he finally asks.

“You turned me down the last time I offered.”

Rin twists to face him. “Jeez, why do you think that was?” Then he notices that Haru is still smiling at him, and he blushes. “So, uh, can I?”

Haru nods, and Rin pulls back the covers to slide in with him.

“I like you, too,” Haru says, apropos of nothing.

Rin laughs, but it’s a delighted laugh. “Cool,” he says, infinitely more casually than he feels. Then he sighs and rolls toward Haru on the bed as the weight of it, of what this means, finally hits him. “Man,” he murmurs. “How am I supposed to leave now?”

He’s almost afraid that Haru will tell him not to go, because as much as he needs to, he’d probably listen. But instead, Haru just scoots toward him. “You’ll be back,” he says, and Rin wonders if Haru has understood him perfectly all this time.

“Yeah,” he whispers, grateful. He wraps his arm around Haru’s shoulders and buries his face in Haru’s hair and tells himself that this is only the beginning, that he’ll have all the time in the world to catch up on everything he still has to learn. “I will.”

**Author's Note:**

> Hitoribocchi no Christmas Eve (roughly "all alone on Christmas Eve") is a [very catchy Japanese Christmas song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxfbgEQEKfE).
> 
> Thank you for reading! I would love to hear what you think. :)


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